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Message Digest
Volume 29 : Issue 5 : "text" Format
Messages in this Issue:
Re: Long Distance On Same Physical Switch
Re: Long Distance On Same Physical Switch
Re: Long Distance On Same Physical Switch
Re: Long Distance On Same Physical Switch
Re: Long Distance On Same Physical Switch
Re: AT&T asking FCC for "end date" of switched network...
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Date: Mon, 04 Jan 2010 11:41:50 -0800
From: Sam Spade <sam@coldmail.com>
To: redacted@invalid.telecom.csail.mit.edu
Subject: Re: Long Distance On Same Physical Switch
Message-ID: <2wr0n.1735$rL7.1243@newsfe23.iad>
Garrett Wollman wrote:
> I'll still keep the landline because the phones themselves are more
> comfortable
>
> -GAWollman
>
With Vonage you can use any phone you can use on POTS.
Date: Wed, 06 Jan 2010 08:56:41 +1100
From: David Clayton <dcstar@myrealbox.com>
To: redacted@invalid.telecom.csail.mit.edu
Subject: Re: Long Distance On Same Physical Switch
Message-ID: <pan.2010.01.05.21.56.37.910938@myrealbox.com>
On Mon, 04 Jan 2010 11:41:50 -0800, Sam Spade wrote:
> Garrett Wollman wrote:
>
>> I'll still keep the landline because the phones themselves are more
>> comfortable
......
> With Vonage you can use any phone you can use on POTS.
As with most VoIP boxes that have the "standard" analogue handset
connection.
I have my cordless phone/answering unit plugged into mine, having given my
land-line number the flick last year, and using Naked DSL since then (I
had my VoIP service for a couple of years before finally cutting off the
land-line - time proved its value).
--
Regards, David.
David Clayton
Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
Knowledge is a measure of how many answers you have, intelligence is a
measure of how many questions you have.
Date: Tue, 5 Jan 2010 18:06:04 -0500
From: T <kd1s.nospam@cox.nospam.net>
To: redacted@invalid.telecom.csail.mit.edu
Subject: Re: Long Distance On Same Physical Switch
Message-ID: <MPG.25ad8fda7b3678a6989c36@news.eternal-september.org>
In article <pan.2010.01.05.21.56.37.910938@myrealbox.com>,
dcstar@myrealbox.com says...
>
> On Mon, 04 Jan 2010 11:41:50 -0800, Sam Spade wrote:
>
> > Garrett Wollman wrote:
> >
> >> I'll still keep the landline because the phones themselves are more
> >> comfortable
> ......
> > With Vonage you can use any phone you can use on POTS.
>
> As with most VoIP boxes that have the "standard" analogue handset
> connection.
>
> I have my cordless phone/answering unit plugged into mine, having given my
> land-line number the flick last year, and using Naked DSL since then (I
> had my VoIP service for a couple of years before finally cutting off the
> land-line - time proved its value).
Made the switch five years ago and never looked back.
Date: Tue, 05 Jan 2010 21:38:50 -0700
From: Robert Neville <dont@bother.com>
To: redacted@invalid.telecom.csail.mit.edu
Subject: Re: Long Distance On Same Physical Switch
Message-ID: <u748k597bada5urh3pp679u16ajg15fghq@4ax.com>
T <kd1s.nospam@cox.nospam.net> wrote:
>Made the switch five years ago and never looked back.
I have been on Vonage on top of either cable/dry dsl for over 4 years
now and don't have any particular issue with VOIP in general, other
than when operated as a customer application over residential
broadband, it is highly dependent on the bandwidth, latency and
stability of the underlying circuit.
In my case, VOIP on cable HSI was excellent. I had sufficient
bandwidth both directions and there wasn't any jitter that interfered
with call quality. My current dry DSL line is much slower -
1.5Mbps. Still plenty for downlink, but the limited uplink made
simultaneous calls and file transfers/embded video web pages a
problem.
Finally broke down and ordered a standard voice line. Plan to use
Google Voice as a front end which should get me within $5 or so of
what I was paying to Vonage each month.
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 2010 19:33:13 +0000 (UTC)
From: wollman@bimajority.org (Garrett Wollman)
To: redacted@invalid.telecom.csail.mit.edu
Subject: Re: Long Distance On Same Physical Switch
Message-ID: <hhtfpp$19k2$2@grapevine.csail.mit.edu>
In article <9t64k5d2phsakd9glnfl662piu1i2sn3fv@4ax.com>,
Robert Neville <nobody@nowhere.com> wrote:
>wollman@bimajority.org (Garrett Wollman) wrote:
>
>>Unless you have a family of teenage girls, I don't see any reason for
>>wanting an unlimited-time cell plan. And haven't the teenagers of
>>both sexes switched to text-messaging now?
>>
>>(I've been on the same 150-minute/month plan since 2001 and have only
>>once ever gone over, when I was recuperating from a broken knee away
>>from home and telecommuting.
>
>I think you are overlooking local calls.
I'm "overlooking" them because I don't make any. Well, maybe once
every so often to reschedule a dentist appointment or something of
that nature. I'm at a loss as to what else I might make a local call
for that isn't more easily accomplished online.
-GAWollman
--
Garrett A. Wollman | What intellectual phenomenon can be older, or more oft
wollman@bimajority.org| repeated, than the story of a large research program
Opinions not shared by| that impaled itself upon a false central assumption
my employers. | accepted by all practitioners? - S.J. Gould, 1993
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 2010 14:05:54 -0800 (PST)
From: hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com
To: redacted@invalid.telecom.csail.mit.edu
Subject: Re: AT&T asking FCC for "end date" of switched network...
Message-ID: <3eee6fce-7f2c-44d0-a23f-b9f1a7a7f4ca@d20g2000yqh.googlegroups.com>
On Jan 4, 12:31 am, "Paul Hoffman" <prhkgh.remove-t...@and-this-
too.comcast.net> wrote:
> Recently AT&T asked the FCC to set a date to transition completely
> off traditional "switched technology" telephone networking, in favor
> of packet switched (internet-style) networking. [AT&T claimed that]
> maintaining two parallel networks that accomplish essentially the
> same thing was wasteful and uneconomical, and this has caused quite
> a bit of posts, especially between collectors and users of 'old
> telephone technology' such as me.
>
> At the time I read about AT&T's request I did not realize the
> petition was for the technology in and between central offices, and
> not a bid to remove all copper twisted pair out to consumer's
> premises. However with the ever-increasing amount of fiber either
> to premises or to centralized communication near the end users, my
> [concerns] remain the same.
Where does Verizon fit in all of this? Isn't today's at&t a
relatively small company?
There are several issues in play here, some transparent to the home
subscriber, some possibly of import.
First, today's telephone network is almost all digital even though
most telephone sets are analog. Shortly after your analog signal
leaves your telephone set the telephone company converts it to
digital. This may be done at a line concentrator on a pole, at a
converter box within or near your home (such as with VOIP), or at the
central office.
The question then becomes what kind of digital format will be used to
transmit the signal through the network. Again, that probably will be
transparent to the user. The phone company can choose to make that
signal very high fidelity if it wants, though it will most likely keep
it at the 4 KHz it has been for years for land line and whatever
miserly bandwidth it gives up for cell phones.
That is, if the phone company were to use a new kind packet switching,
it could make it high fidelity or crap, but it could do so now with
its existing transmission.
Second, we must remember the real difference between fibre and copper
(and coax) is capacity. If they replace your copper line with coax or
fibre there is no reason your home telephone set has to change.
As far as I know, other than Touch Tone and fancy features, a
telephone set today is functionally exactly the same as a 1938
telephone set (300 set with F handset). A 1938 set works fine today
and a modern set would work fine on the 1938 network (except for Touch
Tone and some sets offer pulse as an switchable option).
To me, a big change may come where the subscriber's individual
telephone set will do the analog-digital conversion and so emit
digital signals. It likely will use a new carrier-signal and ringing
current instead of the 48V DC and 90V AC 20 Hz used now. But at that
point almost all telephone sets will be obsolete. Subscribers may
have to buy adapters just as rabit ear TV owners had to do. (I
suppose some business sets are digital now.)
As electronics have gotten so cheap, conversion to a uniform standard
isn't as important as it once was. For instance, Amtrak's Northeast
Corridor is powered by ancient 25 Hz current. Years ago there was
consideration to convert this to modern 60 Hz current but it isn't as
big an issue as in the past, certainly not one to justify the cost of
conversion. They're upgrading the power supply but keeping it at 25
Hz.
I'm not sure the at&t claim (it's lower case now, right?) of parallel
networks being a pain is correct. It's digital signals using a
protocol. When we make a telephone call, we do not get dedicated use
of a given digital line between two points. Rather, our digital
stream is multiplexed with lots of other digital streams over a high-
bandwidth high capacity trunk. Obviously the terminal equipment has
to be able to separate down individual calls, but that's what
computers do.
> Also, as far as I can tell, POTS stuff is pretty much copper ONLY
> from the last CO to the houses, and in many cases not all that way
> either as fiber is pushed closer and closer to the customer
> premises, or directly into them in some cases. So if switched
> technology were to be phased out, AT&T would beef up their internet
> backbones, surplus dozens of backbone ESS switches and probably
> hundreds of local CO switches, and start to recover enough copper
> strung throughout the country to probably defray most of the
> transition costs.
I'm not sure the above is accurate. Reclaiming copper is labor
intensive, and copper can multiplex now. Going to fibre is irrelevent
to the switching technology.
I'm not sure there is a separate physical "internet backbone" from
the switched network and the private line network. To make good use
of economies of scale, they simply electronically divide up various
high-volume trunks as needed for various services. That is, it's a
logical division. I strongly doubt it's something like the public
network runs along old US 1 while the internet backbone runs along
I-95.
If i'm not getting this correctly perhaps someone could correct me in
layman's terms.
> The real losses:
>
> 1. Transmission quality - MAYBE ...although quite frankly my home
> line is working as well (if not better) over CATV coax as it did
> w/traditional T&R copper back to the CO.
Since you're using a "new" technology of CATV, it damned better be a
superior transmission and service quality than what you had before.
(Several cable users have complained to me about service qualtiy,
though. However, they like the lower price.)
> 2. Service during power outages and/or other disasters. Even if the
> future continues to have battery plants backed up by diesal
> generators in central offices, it won't be of much use to those who
> are wired up like me. BUT, even if they are backed up well in
> the central offices, how about the fiber feeds to local
> distribution units in the field? How much battery backup do
> those end-of-the-fiber boxes have with them? 6 hours? 12?
> . . .
"Competition" has been the big mantra driving public policy before and
after Divesture. But competition works in multiple ways and not
necessarily in the public interest. For instance, in the regulated
world, telephone and power utilities generally had very strong
networks and recovery labor forces since the rate base had no choice
but to pay for it and the PUCs encouraged it.
But with competition, consumers have fled from high cost to low cost,
not worrying about recovery during troubles. In the advent of power
competition, many electric companies have become too lean and needed
much longer time to repair storm damage, plus had less redundancy and
would fail more easily. (Retire power people told me they were very
glad to get out since the modern world is skimpy and ugly).
That has already happened to the landline telephone business. Support
is harder to get; repairs take longer. I'm afraid those expensive
C.O. diesel generators will be scrapped because the baby bells will
figure, "Hey, the other guys are stealing our customers by lower
price, so we have to become lean, too". I strongly doubt the cable
companies have diesel generators and huge batteries in their terminal
rooms.
[public replies, please]
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End of The Telecom digest (6 messages)
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